By Hayat Indriyatno 23 February 2013 (Jakarta Globe) – Major palm oil producers accused of destroying Indonesia’s forests and driving its iconic wildlife to the verge of extinction are now taking their practices to the relatively pristine forests of the Congo Basin, an environmental group has warned. In its report, Seeds of Destruction released this […]
By Maria Dolan18 February 2013 (Slate) – Behind the counter at Seattle’s Taylor Shellfish Market, a brawny guy with a goatee pries open kumamoto, virginica, and shigoku oysters as easily as other men pop beer cans. David Leck is a national oyster shucking champion who opened and plated a dozen of them in just over […]
By Brad Plumer 20 February 2013 (Washington Post) – America’s prairies are shrinking. Spurred on by the rush for biofuels, farmers are digging up grasslands in the northern Plains to plant crops at the quickest pace since the 1930s. While that’s been a boon for farmers, the upheaval could create unexpected problems. A new study […]
17 February 2013 (Sea Shepherd Australia) – In the early hours of the 17th of February, while the SSS Sam Simon was tailing the South Korean owned Sun Laurel, fuel bunker ship to the Japanese whaling fleet, the Sam Simon crew noticed the smell of diesel fumes coming from the wake of the Sun Laurel, […]
Contact: Stacy Kika, kika.stacy@epa.gov, 202-564-0906, 202-564-435514 February 2013 WASHINGTON (EPA) – Transocean Deepwater Inc. pleaded guilty today to a violation of the Clean Water Act (CWA) for its illegal conduct leading to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, and was sentenced to pay $400 million in criminal fines and penalties, Attorney General Holder announced today. In […]
By Carrie Madren 12 February 2013 (Scientific American) – In perhaps the slowest invasion in history, mountain meadows in the Pacific Northwest—where hikers and backpackers revel in breath-taking scenery—are gradually giving way to hemlocks, Pacific silver firs and other conifers. In these high-elevation, subalpine meadows of Jefferson Park in the central Cascade Range in Oregon, […]
By DYLAN WALSH15 February 2013 (The New York Times) – For Elizabeth Farnsworth, the story began when she was walking her dog at a highway rest stop off Interstate 94 in North Dakota. “My husband and I met a trucker who was making $100,000 per year,” said Ms. Farnsworth, a freelance filmmaker and special correspondent […]
By PAM BELLUCK14 February 2013 (The New York Times) – Traces of a common psychiatric medication that winds up in rivers and streams may affect fish behavior and feeding patterns, according to a study in the journal Science published Thursday. Researchers in Sweden exposed wild European perch to water with different concentrations of Oxazepam, an […]
By Hannah Hickey 13 February 2013 (University of Washington) – The September 2012 record low in Arctic sea-ice extent was big news, but a missing piece of the puzzle was lurking below the ocean’s surface. What volume of ice floats on Arctic waters? And how does that compare to previous summers? These are difficult but […]
By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent; Editing by Doina Chiacu9 February 2013 WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The population of moose in northeastern Minnesota dropped by 35 percent since last year, prompting state officials to cancel this year’s fall hunt and conservationists to blame warming temperatures for the massive creature’s decline. “The state’s moose population has been in […]
